... and Turkey) military and more secular interests operating 'against the people'. And so Britain arrived East of Suez on a false prospectus and without adequate resources and planning between 2001 and 2003. As we go into 2008, it is stuck there as part of a violent cultural struggle in which its allies are, in some cases, less liberal than some of its critics. The UK has been trapped into a commitment to a far-away country that will be expensive and possibly futile in the long run in terms of the original liberal aspirations of 2001. Already, Afghanistan has given up on one liberal value execution by firing squad is back on the agenda. But let us step ...

... ] the way [we...] process information. The new disaster economy has been subject to none of this kind of far reaching discussion. (Naomi Klein, 2007) There are those who think Naomi Klein has sold out. According to Stephen Marshall's important but flawed book, Wolves in Sheep's Clothing, she's just another 'fallen liberal' who either provides ineffective and impotent criticism of the present neo-conservative order or actually feeds it. It's because of the essential truth in much of what Marshall says about former Left renegades in his book, that I decided to review it and Klein's new work together. My conclusion is that while Klein's acceptance of notions like 'capitalist globalisation' ...

... unaware of) 50 years of research which showed that background (i.e. essentially class) was the key determinant of educational outcomes. So teachers produced a million lesson plans seeking uniformity of teaching, faked their exam results to meet government targets and the class differences in performance remain. 2001 'TB...felt we had to keep the Liberals to our left on some issues and hope that the Tories try to come towards the centre on Europe but right on other issues.' pp. 550/1 So-called triangulation, learned from the Democrats. 2002 'Murdoch was coming in for dinner....Murdoch was at one point putting the traditional very right-wing view on Israel and the ...

... of the above, do you reckon, do we get this? 'I gradually became aware that the conventional narrative structure which is used to give sense and meaning to British politics was extremely misleading. Though the public is told that Tory and Labour are in opposition, that is not really the case. They are led to believe that the Liberal Democrats are an insurgent third party, but that is not the case. It has come to seem to me that their strongest loyalties are to each other.' Oborne's denunciation of the way the 'Political Class' is ruining his beloved Britain is a compelling read. His detailing of the corruption, venality, nepotism and mendacity of the ...

... and the dream of an Islamic republic in Britain yet we are all too aware that that struggle has already given rise to acts of terrorism. And whilst I'm having a gripe the index. Mary Shelley is in, but Percy Bysshe Shelley is absent. The IRA is in but the Provisional IRA have been missed out. The Scottish National Liberation Army are in, but not the Scottish National League (Comunn nan Albananch). Wendy Wood appears in the index, but Hugh MacDiarmid (on the same page) doesn't. At best the index is incomplete, at worst almost random in what it includes and excludes. Generally the emphasis on 'terrorism' has skewed the text towards ...

... were being held, and the fact that their torturers were the CIA's own paid informants. Moreover, the Agency did its best to ensure that 'the torturers were shielded from any legal or political consequences.' Similarly, the covert war against Nicaragua involved a campaign of terror waged by CIA mercenaries that was nevertheless presented to the world as a liberation struggle. President Ronald Reagan celebrated 'the contras' as men in the same mould as the 'Founding Fathers' of the United States. This did not stop him trying to subvert the Constitution the Founding Fathers had drawn up in order to conduct his illegal war, something conveniently forgotten in the eulogies that accompanied his death. Moreover, as ...

... , this will be the most fiendish embarrassment to the Lord Advocate.' He also criticised the Scottish criminal justice system for not having a proper system for disclosure of information. 'In Scotland the Crown is allowed to modify or withhold evidence if it considers that withholding is in the "public interest" .'(21) Baker on Kelly Liberal Democrat MP Norman Baker's book The Strange Death of David Kelly (London: Politico's Publishing) received extensive press coverage prior to its publication in November. According to Baker, not only does medical evidence support the view that Kelly did not commit suicide, there is also the fact that no fingerprints were found on the penknife that he had ...

... of security can emerge that can match its continental counterparts in powers and tools. The European project requires a 'Frenchification' of our security culture by people who are instinctive Republicans. It is not that New Labour wants an illiberal regime per se. New Labour is not fascist unless we think European republicanism is inherently fascist it is merely indifferent to liberal individualism. In Europe, it is normal to limit free speech (as in the ban on Holocaust denial) or to engage in some surprisingly arbitrary actions in order to preserve the state as guarantor of the mixed economy, the rule of law and democracy. This attitude has not been the norm in the UK since the age of ...

... timed better. It brings together an historical background to the present crisis (which goes back 100 years), on-the-ground research done by the two authors on behalf of the Swedish weekly Arbetaren (The Worker), and extensive reading of both the émigré and internal publications that stand outside both the official media of the state of Iran and the liberal democratic consensus of the western democracies. The first part of the book is a look at Iran from the inside. It gives a full account of the events that lead up to the Islamic Revolution of 1979 that overthrew the hated regime of the 'Shah of Persia' and his equally hated security and police apparatus; explains why the revolution ...

... without end and the one that assumes protection of the environment is entirely compatible with limitless economic growth. Someone else will have this 'legacy' to deal with as Mr Blair heads off into his well-paid ex-premiership status. The ten-year long weekend from reality will be over. Jonathan Bloch: The day after Blair was elected in 1997 I joined the Liberal Democrat Party. His election led me to take this step for two reasons: firstly, I feared for the state of civil liberties in the country and also, with the Lib Dems obtaining more parliamentary seats, they had graduated from been a fringe political party to a more serious player. What caused me to fear for civil liberties ...